Birdsboro man sentenced to state prison for Amtrak wire theft

WEST CHESTER — The theft of wire along railroad tracks in West Whiteland earned a Berks County man a trip to state prison on Monday.

Chester County Common Pleas Court Judge William Mahon sentenced James F. Martin of Birdsboro to 18 months to three years in prison on charges of theft by unlawful taking for the February incident.

Police said a township officer caught him in the act of cutting wire from the line that ran near the Whitford train station. Martin’s actions caused travel to be halted along the Harrisburg to Philadelphia line as workers lost track of train signals, police reported.

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Martin, 41, was also sentenced to two years of consecutive probation on charges of causing or risking a catastrophe and was ordered to pay $39,258 to Amtrak for the cost of the wire and the expense of dealing with the service disruption.

An Amtrak employee told police that the loss of signals on the line and the inability to track trains could have resulted in a rail accident involving passenger or freight trains. Service had to be suspended along the line, disrupting commuter SEPTA trains between Thorndale and Malvern.

Court records say West Whiteland police were dispatched to the Whitford station about 12:41 p.m. Feb. 24 for the report of theft of wire alongside the tracks.

Officer Jeffrey McCloskey spoke to Amtrak representative Dale Crawford, who said the switching lines had been cut and all signals along the line were shut down and affecting rail traffic.

Crawford told McCloskey he had spotted a man in the woods with a ladder cutting the lines with a saw. When the pair went into the woods near the station, McCloskey saw a man later identified as Martin.

When Martin saw the officer, he ran out of the woods toward the train tracks. But he stumbled and fell, and McCloskey detained him. Police later found a Dodge Ram truck belonging to Martin in the station parking lot, and about 75 feet of signal line that had been cut. The wire contains copper, which can be sold at recycling centers.

Martin was charged and held in Chester County Prison for two days before posting bail.

Martin pleaded guilty to the charges in August and was sentenced by Mahon without an agreement between his attorney, Francis Miller of West Chester, and the prosecutor, Assistant District Attorney Max O’Keefe.

Coincidentally, Mahon had sentenced a Honey Brook man to prison just one month before Martin’s crime for the very same offense, cutting the copper wire along the Amtrak tracks west of Exton. William James Stauffer was sentenced to six to 23 months in prison and ordered to repay $28,650 to Amtrak on Jan. 22.